Round Midnight
by Scruffys Sweetheart
Summary: Moments in time from the fateful Trip to Bespin
1. Chapter 1 - In the Heat of the Night

This chapter is my "missing moment" that occurs within the events of _Intermission_ by Erin Darroch and Justine Graham, during the fateful Trip to Bespin:

 **"** _ **Their first union had been the purest physical expression of love... and the second, a few hours later, had only intensified that connection. The third time—initiated by Leia's hand gliding with purpose over his hip, waking him from a sound sleep—had felt as natural and right as waking up with her in his arms felt now."** _

_A big thanks to Erin Darroch and Justine Graham for allowing me to play in their universe and for their generous efforts in helping to make this first fic better than I could have imagined. I was inspired as well by this beautiful cover image, which may be the work of the talented Leela Starsky - if anyone can ascertain the identity of the artist, please let me know so I can give credit where credit is most clearly due!_

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Leia awoke in the darkened cabin, blinking to clear her eyes as she surveyed the unfamiliar surroundings. Her momentary disorientation began to ease as the tumultuous events of the past week seeped back into her consciousness. A time in which her life had been turned upside down by yet another seismic shift, this one shaking her off the icy hellscape of Hoth mere footsteps ahead of the Empire but landing her _again_ within the safe confines of the _Millennium Falcon_ , now limping towards Bespin on overtaxed sublight engines.

The _Falcon_ 's captain began to crowd her waking thoughts, as Leia rolled to her side in the double-wide bunk, facing the other occupant but careful not to disturb him. With the stress of completing in-flight repairs to his beloved but temperamental ship and ensuring that they made it to Bespin, Han needed all the rest he could get. As she cautiously stretched to relieve the stiffness in her arms and legs, other more unfamiliar but nevertheless pleasant aches reminded her of what had transpired earlier in the night, hinting at the challenge it might be to keep either of them in a state that resembled _rested_ or _relaxed_.

Flushing with warmth at the memories of making love, Leia focused her eyes in the low light of the cabin on his stilled form, lying on his side facing her. He was still asleep, confirmed by the deep steady sound of his breathing. She watched the slow rise and fall of his bare chest, still a bit amazed at finding herself likewise naked and in bed with Han, although shedding her clothes had been much easier than lowering the long-held emotional shield she had used to keep him at bay.

With that barrier at last discarded, a myriad of conflicting feelings—nervous excitement, relief, fear of an uncertain future, regret over time lost—swirled around her. But for now, for _this_ moment, Leia chose to set those worries aside and instead bask solely in the overwhelming joy she felt, as if savoring the sliver of light that had pierced through the dark storm clouds that seem to have settled over her life of late.

She had wanted this— _him_ —for so long now, although until tonight she had only ever admitted that in the most private chambers of her heart. Han had always stirred a riot of emotions within her, which had proved a dilemma for her practical and logical mind. Even in their first fraught moments together on the Death Star, with Han wielding his blaster and his mouth with the same indiscriminate recklessness, she had been simultaneously enraged and excited by him. How could someone's mere presence be irritating and riveting at the same time?

But as Han remained with the Alliance to smuggle supplies and run the occasional mission, all the while proclaiming to be uncommitted to anything other than himself, his co-pilot and his ship, she had found her trust in him inexplicably deepen to where she not only relied on him but came to need him, and not just for supply runs to procure more bacta or powdered blue milk.

As her need for him had grown into a fervent want, it had taken near superhuman efforts to hide her attraction to him, so often betrayed by her hair-trigger blush, which Han seemed to love eliciting for his own enjoyment. But she had secretly thrilled whenever she heard the deep rumble of his voice, whether he was arguing with Chewie over repairs or laughing over Luke's incredulous reaction to finding himself on a planet surrounded by nothing by frozen water. Sometimes blood would rush to her face—and to other more interesting regions—with just a glance at Han, especially when her gaze unexpectedly met with his hazel eyes, which blazed out above a nose clearly broken more than once and full sensuous lips underlined by a mysterious slash of scar. He had appeared unbidden in her sleep, between nightmares, and soon after invaded her waking thoughts as well. She had tried to banish him from her mind and bar him from her bruised and battered heart—after all, he **was** going to leave at some point, as he reminded her and anyone else listening on a regular basis. But the more firmly she resolved to purge him from her system, the more entrenched hold he took on her mind, her heart and her body.

Tonight, though, the long battle that she had waged within herself was over at last, attested to by the vivid memories from their earlier encounters of that evening that now innundated her mind.

Their first time together earlier that evening, as their passion flowed unchecked, had been overwhelming in its beauty and its intensity. Her body still felt tingles of hot waves of pleasure from Han's questing mouth and his caressing hands as he took his first loving inventory of her bared body, and the heat of him when she arched against him as he instigated a tender and more intimate exploration. But while the pleasure he stoked in her trembling body had been beyond anything she had imagined, it was her ability to finally express what she had been trying so desperately to deny for years that had provided her with a more explosive release. The much needed unfettering of her emotions had amplified the exquisite pleasure he incited in her, making her unable to focus on what was going on outside the immediate confines of her body and mind.

In the hazy afterglow, as she began to come back to herself and the reality within the cabin, she had wondered—in a state of happy delirium—whether her body, mind or soul would ever go back to their previous normal state of being. Casting a shy smile at Han, who had returned the most genuinely content smile she had ever seen on his usually smirking face, she'd crawled back into his waiting arms and nestled herself against his damp cooling skin, pressing her lips softly to wherever they happened to fall and listening to his soft sighs in response.

Exhausted by their outpouring of passion, Han and Leia had drifted in and out of a light sleep. But each time they had bobbed to the surface of consciousness, their hands had come to life as well, resuming a lazy circuit of gentle caresses, reluctant to break that vital connection that had been so hard fought to establish. Before long, their touches had become more sensual and deliberate, and as Han nuzzled her cheek, he whispered heatedly that he wanted her again. As he beckoned her back into a hazy sea of arousal with his increasingly heated play, she'd marvelled this time with open unbridled lust at his long muscled body—his broad chest with a light dusting of hair and firm flat stomach, his lean hips and powerful thighs, and his beautifully sculpted backside.

As she began to tentatively chart and claim this new territory for herself, she had delighted in noticing the slight tremble in his hands as he stroked her flushed cheeks, seeing his eyes squeeze shut in a look of pained concentration when her lips traced a delicate and haphazard trail over his hard masculine contours, and hearing his ragged gasp as she grazed his straining erection. Earlier, when he had pleasured her with great tenderness, passion and skill, her own lack of depth in this realm of experience had left Leia slightly anxious about whether she would be able to ignite in him the same sort of euphoric ecstasy in which she was awash. But these doubts dissipated as she beheld his unbridled responses to her tender caresses.

Looking up at him, now poised over her with a potent look that was both hungry and needful as he moved within her, she saw the undeniable proof in his eyes of the powerful effect she had on him, a realization that sent an immediate rush of intensity to every part of her inflamed body and quickly propelled her over the edge. As her body continued to quiver with aftershocks, she drew him down close in her arms and hugged him tightly. He buried his head next to hers, moaning a quiet but pleading "Sweetheart" into her hair while his hips drove out his own frantic release. Then, utterly exhausted and finally overcome, they had fallen into the deep and satisfied sleep of new lovers.

Now, wide awake from reliving the vivid memories of the night's events, she swept her eyes over his still form, stirring her hunger for him and overriding her concern for his adequate rest. As she extended her hand to trace her fingertip over the intriguing vein running down his bulging bicep, his breathing abruptly shifted and he rolled onto his back, leaving Leia with an unobstructed view of his beautiful and apparently aroused body. Even in his sleep, his body seemed to react to her nearness, acting beyond his conscious control, as if in a state of persistent need for her.

Leia's hand changed course and glided over his hip, drawn irresistibly by the enticing sight of his erection on display for her. She reached out to curl her slender fingers around him and, finding him hot to the touch, jolted as if sparked by a live wire. She gentled her grasp, letting her fingers explore the rock-solid hardness of his long length, marvelling at the contrasting textures of the smooth soft skin and coarse curly hair. She was fascinated by both the seeming oddity of the male sexual organ and by the strong primal feelings it stirred in her, especially in light of her new-found knowledge of the pleasure it could bring to both of them.

Greedy to discover further intimate secrets of his gorgeously charged body, Leia rose to a kneeling position near his side and then sat back on her heels. As her fingertips mapped the rippled contours of his muscled abdomen, she glanced up at Han's face to find a pair of smoldering eyes staring back at her. He made no movement, except for that of his eyes intently following her hand, seemingly giving his tacit permission to continue her bold exploration of his body.

"Just can't keep your hands off me, Your Worship?" he murmured, his voice husky with sleep. His eyes began to crinkle and the corner of his mouth tilted up in a gratified smile.

In silent reply, she held his gaze steady as she wrapped her small hand around his thick length again and began a slow stroke, while her other hand slowly glided up his abdomen to his chest, her fingers sliding through his chest hair to graze and tease his nipples. His bemused look quickly gave way to one of breathless anticipation, as his brow furrowed and his mouth fell open to release a hoarse groan.

Gauging the size of him in her tiny hand, she slid her other hand at his chest back down to allow both to bear fully on his rigid manhood. In response, his hips began to thrust in counterpoint to the motion of her hands, and he began to moan her name as if praying before a goddess.

Leia felt the wild surge of her own arousal course through her as if she had been hard-wired into a high-voltage circuitry grid, evoked by the potent combination of Han's ready body on display for her and the evidence of intense pleasure she could incite in him. Although Han displayed swagger and cocksure attitude to the galaxy at large, the vulnerability he revealed in these private moments of passion, coupled with the deep desire and frenzied want that she could stir in him, were heady for her, transforming any of her remaining hesitation into a powerful want and drive of its own.

Leia moved to kneel between his parted legs to take further command of his body, but Han, no longer able to remain a passive participant, reached for her, his large hands quickly swarming her body. He pulled her small frame possessively down towards his own, groaning as he drew her soft full breasts and hardened nipples to his hot open mouth for a ravenous midnight feast.

When his hungry mouth at last devoured her lips in a fiery kiss, she whimpered and opened her mouth to the rough insistence of his tongue. As their kiss quickly deepened, he rolled her to her back and she folded her legs around him, allowing Han to slide his impatient erection against her aching core, his hips already thrusting in instinctive need. As she felt him glide hard against her ready center, he let out an agonized groan and quickly adjusted the angle of his hips to sink deep inside her in a single powerful thrust, driving a ragged echoing moan from Leia.

Finally intimately connected, the frenetic energy that had snapped their bodies together like a pair of magnets seemed to ease slightly, soothing the fierce urgency to which they had awakened. As their hips continued to move together in a slow hypnotic rhythm, they shared sweet unhurried kisses and clasped hands, interlacing fingers as Han gently moved her arms back to brace them beside her head. This languid midnight coupling, in contrast to those earlier, was quiet yet powerful, filled with soft moans and deep contented sighs, while their locked eyes bore witness to the tremendous flow of feelings coursing between them.

At the heightened state with which they had initiated this latest union, it wasn't long before they were both teetering on the slippery edge of release. As Han moved his hand down between them to add a perfectly placed touch to the intimate joining of their bodies, Leia began to writhe beneath him, moaning in earnest. The last thing she saw was a look of sweet joyful pride on Han's face before she arched back and split the silence of the cabin by wailing out for him with the desperate cry of his name for the first time. Seemingly robbed of control by her plea for him, Han's movements became forceful and erratic, until he finally exploded within her with his own strangled shout.

Sated but thoroughly spent, the weary lovers began to recover in the resumed silence of the cabin, clinging tightly in their embrace to maintain warmth as their bodies rapidly cooled. Leia could still feel the roiling heat of her emotions, and a glance up at Han revealed an almost pensive look on his face.

Noticing her eyes on him after a moment, his face conjured a faint smile, so unlike his usual trademark grin, but his eyes glittered at her like a kaleidoscope, projecting wonder, fear, and love. Tightening his arms around her, Han broke their shared gaze, closing his eyes but tenderly anointing the crown of her head with the warmth of his lips, as if admitting the truth of what his gaze had just revealed.

Ensconced securely in the safety of his strong embrace, she nestled closer to him, burrowing her head on his chest to feel the comforting beat of his heart, pounding out a coded message to her own. The buzzing of her emotions began to quiet, as if they were finding their proper places to settle, and soothed by the low humming lullaby of the _Falcon_ 's engines, she closed her eyes, content and fearless to give herself to sleep, to Han, to life.


	2. Chapter 2 - Not While I'm Around

A heartfelt thanks to KnightedRogue, justinegraham and erindarroch, my beta readers/midwives who helped birth this chapter, which is my take on a familar trope - the time and wisdom that you shared with me are invaluable, and I hope your readers will forgive me for hogging your time, when it would have likely been better spent concocting your own new stories to delight us all.

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" _Nothing's gonna harm you_

 _No sir, not while I'm around_

 _Demons are prowling everywhere nowadays_

 _I'll send them howling, I don't care, I've got ways_

 _No one's gonna hurt you_

 _No one's gonna dare_

 _Others can desert you_

 _Not to worry, whistle I'll be there…"_

 _-Stephen Sondheim_

 ** _Once up a time, on the long flight to Bespin…_**

Han knew it was going to be one of _those_ days as he stood shivering in front of the engineering station in the main hold. Barely halfway to Bespin, the _Falcon_ had sprung yet another in a string of surprises on its captive crew and passengers - this time, a critical failure in the environmental control system, plunging the ship's interior to near Hoth-level temperatures.

As Han shouted instructions to Chewie - armed with an array of tools to try whatever suggestions Han barked out - Leia supplied them with an endless stream of weak but steaming kaf to warm their shaking hands and clumsy fingers as they worked frantically to bring the system back online.

When at last the enviro system indicator light changed from its flashing urgent red to a calm steady green, they all breathed a collective but chilly sigh of relief. Not wanting to chance an overload of the newly repaired system, Han adjusted the settings for a slow ramp-up to normal conditions.

"Gonna be colder in here than a wampa's wang in winter for awhile," Han grumbled.

Chewie, smoothing down his thick pelt with pride, gave a shrug at Han's pronouncement but then looked over at Leia, who stood swimming in the depths of Han's brown parka, which hung down below her knees.

Noting Chewie's concerned glance, Han smirked. "Don't worry, Sweetheart, I'll keep you warm enough tonight. Maybe even hot, and a little bothered too."

Looking at Chewie as she shook her head and rolled her eyes at Han's boast, Leia addressed the Wookiee. "Chewie, where do you keep the cold weather gear? Just in case my Corellian heat generator blows a fuse?"

As Chewie roared in laughter, he pointed a furry hand towards the forward hold. Between snorts of laughter, Chewie tried to specify the exact location within the hold, but his chortling made it difficult for Leia to understand, even with her recent mastery of Shyriiwook basics over the past few weeks.

"Fuzzball, you better pull it together, 'cause I wanna check the rest of the systems before we have another burnout. Gonna start with the sensor array system, so shimmy your furry butt up into that overhead circuitry compartment."

Turning to Leia, Han feigned hurt at her remark. "You wound me, Your Worship." With a nod towards the forward hold, he continued. "Gray metal bin on the top shelf. Yell if you need a hand, or _anything_ else."

In answer, Leia raised an amused eyebrow at him before pulling the fur-trimmed hood of his coat up over her head and turning on her heels to make her way toward the forward hold.

Still chuckling to himself with an occasional guffaw, Chewie gathered the necessary tools into his leather pouch as Han settled at the engineering station to start the sensor calibration sequence.

Just as Chewie began to make his way into the overhead circuitry compartment, a wail of surprise broke the relative quiet of the ship, followed by a loud crash and a muffled moan of pain. Han turned to lock eyes with his hairy co-pilot, who reflected back a look on concern upon realizing the only possible source of the sounds. Han bolted from his seat towards the forward hold with Chewie in close pursuit.

When they arrived at the entrance to the hold, they were met with the sight of Leia sprawled on the deck plates, trapped under a heavy metal cargo bin. "What the —" Han managed as Chewie rushed passed him to lift the large bulky bin off Leia's legs.

"I climbed the access ladder to check through the highest bins and the top step snapped. I grabbed for the bin and must have pulled it down with me when I fell. At least I found the right bin," Leia quipped, as she struggled to sit up onto her elbows, looking around at the exploded bin's contents scattered about the deck plates.

Han mentally cursed himself at the sight of the busted access ladder. Neither he nor the towering Wookiee ever used it to access the upper storage area, so he'd had no idea it was in such flimsy shape. _Is there anything on this ship that isn't falling apart?_

Leia broke Han's irate thoughts with a gasp of mingled relief and advancing pain at the removal of the heavy metal bin from her legs. Kneeling beside her, Han closely examined her head and face, peering deeply into her eyes. "Don't move, Princess. You look a little dazed; you hit your head?"

"No, Hotshot, I'm just swooning from your manly presence," Leia jibed, rolling her eyes at him with an exasperated affection. Wincing, she added, "But my foot hurts like holy hells."

Han chuckled to himself, unaccustomed to hearing her swear. He turned his attention to her leg while awaiting Chewie's return with the med kit and portable medscanner. Rolling up her loose pant leg (well, really _his_ pant leg) to assess the damage as tenderly as possible, he saw Leia cringe as his fingers neared her ankle, which was beginning to swell.

"Doesn't seem like anything is broken, but let's get you scanned to make sure," Han muttered.

Luckily, the scan showed no signs of bone breaks or concussion, but Leia's ankle was badly sprained and a number of bruises were beginning to bloom on her legs. _Will make a nice matching set,_ Han thought wryly, recalling the large but fading bruise on her back, the result of him tackling her to shield her from the icy debris of the collapsing corridor during their mad dash off Hoth. _Really know how to show a lady a good time, don't you, Solo?_

Woofing softly, Chewie gently prodded them off to bed for some much-needed rest and warmth: the precautionary systems checks could wait for the time being. "No argument there, pal. Come on, Princess, let's get you tucked in for the night."

Han slipped his arms underneath her knees and around her back, lifting her with ease as he took care not to jostle her injured leg. As he hugged her close for warmth, Leia wrapped her arms around his neck, her long single braid dangling against his arm as he walked them to his cabin. Nuzzling her face into the crook of his stubble-covered neck, she whispered "I think you're overreacting, Flyboy, but I'll indulge you if you plan to carry me around like this."

When they arrived at the door to the cabin, Leia playfully extended her uninjured foot to tap the hatch controls. The frigid air of the vacant room assaulted them as the door slid open. It would be unbearably cold in the cabin tonight, and the heating unit within the bunk would only do so much to keep them warm.

Han gently lowered Leia onto the bunk. As she shrugged off his parka and began to maneuver beneath the sheets, Han ducked into the fresher to retrieve pain meds and a glass of water for her.

"Back in a sec, Sweetheart," he assured her as he left the cabin.

Han hurried back to the forward hold to retrieve the blankets and other cold weather gear strewn across the floor from the toppled bin and gathered up as much as he could carry. As he headed to the door, his eyes landed on the culprit ladder, mocking him with the askew smirk of its broken top rung.

The frustration of the long day caught up with him as his quick temper flared. Arms full, Han strode over to the ladder and assailed it with his booted foot until the ladder was dislodged from the wall and lay mangled on the floor. Satisfied with his revenge on the traitorous ladder, he hurried on his way back to the cabin, detouring through the galley to grab his bottle of Whyren's.

Back in the cabin, Han was surprised to find Leia still awake, giving him a small smile as she clung to the covers around her. "Hurry up, Hotshot, it's _freezing_ in here," she managed through chattering teeth.

He dropped the recovered contents of the bin to the floor and bent to sift through for the thickest covers he could find. As he spread the extra blankets over the bunk, tucking them around her, Han could see her eyes starting to grow soft with impending sleep as the strong pain meds began to take hold. He hoped she would be able to sleep tonight, knowing all too well how the cold could affect Leia. Han layered on one more cover as insurance against those terrifying spectres that often crept in along with the chill of night.

Sitting on the edge of the bunk, he gazed down at her as he watched her eyes begin to flutter closed. "I'm getting to be a hazard for you, Sweetheart," he muttered, stroking a finger gently across her smooth cheek. "Probably better off without me around," he whispered, bending to kiss her forehead as she finally surrendered to sleep.

He remained perched on the edge of the bunk, reaching down for the Whyren's and uncorking it for a short swig. As the fiery liquid burned a path down his throat, he turned back to look at Leia as she sank into stillness, watching her rosy lips part as her breaths fell into a slow measured pace.

Normally it calmed him to behold her rare moments of quiet. Tonight his private watch over her did little to settle his nerves.

Han downed a second shot of whiskey to ward off the cold and the uneasiness he couldn't seem to shake, and then slipped off the bunk, wincing at the loud creak that threatened the quiet that had descended over the room. Shrugging off his jacket and shirt and stripping off his bloodstripes as quickly and quietly as he could, he looked around the cabin for something to sleep in. As of late, he'd had little reason to wear much of anything to bed, but with Leia injured and already asleep, and his own breath visible in the crystalline air, he would need something for the night.

Glancing down at the pile of cold weather gear at his feet, Han spotted a pair of long thermal underwear he had packed away recently, back when Tatooine had been the next intended stop after Hoth. That seemed like a lifetime ago - sometimes even felt like three lifetimes since then, or someone else's life altogether. Sliding the thermals on, he bent to grab the last of the blankets from the pile on the floor.

Han adjusted the cabin lights to the night setting and eased himself under the cover of sheets, careful not to disturb the cocoon of blankets he had built around Leia. He arranged the last remaining blanket over himself, and as he lay shivering, he turned his head to ensure he hadn't wakened Leia with his jostling, but she seemed deep in sleep and undisturbed by his presence.

The blanket and the whiskey combined to slowly ease his shaking. Han's eyes began to close at last. Before long, he had drifted off to join Leia in the cold darkness of the night...

 _Leia sat tall, majestic, astride Han. Her legs parted wide to straddle his hips and her hands splayed across his chest to steady herself as she rode him with fierce abandon. Han was mesmerized by the hypnotic bounce of her breasts as the sensual undulation of her hips took command of him. He slid his palms from her thighs to purchase a gentle hold on her waist. Under the spell of her possessing urgency, Han thrust his hips up in communion with hers, driving himself impossibly deeper between her trembling thighs. Leia let out a shuddering moan as she threw her head back, her long chestnut braid sinking like an anchored chain to sway teasingly between his thighs._

 _But her eyes flew open in confusion as a large gloved hand grabbed her braid. Her moan became a cry of pain as her head snapped back with a vicious yank to meet with the muzzle of a blaster poised at her temple._

" _Get your fucking hands off her," Han growled with fatal intent, but he remained frozen in place, flat on his back and unable to move a muscle to wrestle her away from the armed assailant. Leia, eyes wide in fear and arms reaching frantically for Han, cried out to him in a desperate plea as she was dragged from his sight._

" _Leia," he screamed with a hoarse desperation, "LEIA!"_

" _Time to pay up, Solo," the bounty hunter snarled, and with the sound of a single blaster shot, Leia's cries were silenced. Still lying frozen and helpless, Han flinched in horror as a severed braid landed squarely across his bare body._

" _Maybe this will finally teach you, you lowlife scum."_

Han jolted awake with a terrified shout, heart slamming at his ribs as panic spiked through him. He looked around the darkened blue glow of the cabin, unable to orient himself as the horror of the nightmare continued to squeeze his heart in a chaotic rhythm. When he realized his hands could move freely, they swept across his sweat-slicked face.

Panting, he strained to pull himself back to the edge of reality and drive the ugly echoes of Ord Mantell back into the dark corners of his mind. But as many times as he had tried to bury away what had happened with the bounty hunter and what _could_ have happened, he knew he'd never be able to erase the terrifying sight of Leia, caught in the crosshairs of his own past mistakes catching up with him on Ord Mantell.

As his eyes adjusted to the dim blue glow of the cabin's night lights, Han could just make out Leia's small shape next to him in the bunk, still bundled under the mound of bedclothes and curled up on her side with her back to him. Only her dark head was visible above the burrow of blankets, with the end of her long braid tickling the bare skin of his belly.

Han recoiled from the sight, as if the gloved hand from his fading nightmare had made one final grab for him. His panic mounted as he watched the braid begin to move, slowly sliding away from him, until it dawned on him that he must have woken Leia. He felt her small weight shift gingerly in the bunk as she turned to him.

"Han, what is it?" her voice thick and slow with sleep. "Is something wrong? Did you call for me?"

He closed his eyes, tried to will his breathing to slow. "Everything's okay, Princess. Go back to sleep."

Wrestling to maneuver with her injured leg under the mound of bedclothes, she managed to turn to face him and prop herself up to get a closer look at him in the dim blue light.

"You're shaking. Are you shivering?"

She touched his bare chest, still heaving in rhythm with his rapid-fire heartbeat. Before she could inquire further, Han tucked it back beneath the blankets.

"Yeah, m' fine, Sweetheart. Just cold."

Leia reached up to switch on the overhead light within the bunk. He could see a look of alert concern had already swept the sleep from her eyes as she looked closely at him.

"Gonna take a shower to warm up," he said abruptly, throwing back the covers and swinging his legs over the side of the bunk to avoid her searching glance.

Sitting on the edge of the bunk, Han briefly rested his head in his hands before standing as he tried to catch his breath. He felt her small hand on his back like an unspoken question, and he muttered, "Sorry I woke you. Just go back to sleep."

He stood up and reached to turn the overhead bunk light off again, plunging the room back into the dark blue glow of the cabin's night setting. As he made his way to the fresher, Han heard her voice behind him, small and muffled by the alcove of the bunk.

"OK, Hotshot, I'll keep the bunk warm for you."

As the door to the fresher slid open, spilling light into the cabin, he asked, without turning, "Need anything? Another pain med?"

"No, Han. Just you."

Huffing a quiet sigh and running his hand up the back of his neck, he offered no other response and instead headed into the fresher, closing the hatch behind him.

Han squinted in the bright light of the fresher as he activated the water stream, still trying to catch his breath as the water slowly warmed. He stripped off his thermal underwear and stepped into the shower. Bracing his fists against the wall, he hung his head under the spray of tepid water, willing it to wash away the vile residue of his nightmare.

It had been all too easy for Han to ignore the harsher realities of his life of late. Even though he was stranded in the outer reaches of the Anoat system on an unpredictably temperamental ship, with the Empire waiting to pounce at every possible turn, it just hadn't seemed to matter. Han had never been happier in his life.

The past few weeks had been extraordinary, almost unbelievable. It still amazed him to find Leia awaiting him in his bunk at day's end, seeking his warmth, craving his touch, curling up close to his chest as she secretly mined the forgotten pieces of his heart to hoard away for herself. He had been consumed with fantasies about this, about her, about _them_ , for so long that he still expected to wake up alone in his bunk, hard and hungry as the dream of her faded to black and slipped away once again.

 _A princess and a guy like me?_

He remembered the first time he had joked about that very possibility. He had meant it as a jab at the overeager Luke, enthralled over the feisty princess _en route_ to Yavin after their escape from the Death Star.

But as time passed, Han had found himself unable to extinguish the tiny but unwavering flame of that thought, even resorting to repeating it to himself as a warning of the sheer absurdity of the idea. And there _was_ complete absurdity in the idea of a lovely princess and a roguish scheming outlaw finding love together, wasn't there? Hells, yes. That was the stuff of make-believe, of children's bedtime stories, up there with other ridiculous nonsense like the Force.

And Han had certainly come to know the _Princess of Alderaan_ , as well as the _Imperial Senator_ , the _Alliance Commander_ , and even _the Empire's Most Wanted_ , but he had also discovered the complex young woman who sat buried, unnoticed and overlooked, beneath this pile of titles. _That_ woman, _Leia_ , was the one he wanted.

And miraculously, she seemed to want him as well, although _why_ exactly Han didn't think he would ever completely understand. She seemed to believe there was more to him than met the eye, that perhaps he was not quite the _guy like me_ that everyone assumed him to be.

 _Was_ he? _Was_ there something more to him? Leia seemed to think so...

So while the notion of a _princess and a guy like me_ remained a ridiculous one, the idea of _Leia and Han_ did not, finding fertile ground within him in which to take root.

 _But._

The closer they got to Bespin, the more his not-so-distant past and his almost-certain future started to crowd back into his near idyllic present, and tonight's nightmare was a harsh reminder.

It wasn't that Han hadn't take his bounty seriously. His original rationalization for staying with the motley band of rebels was the easy opportunity for steady work, allowing him to save up the funds to pay back Jabba, along with the interest the greedy Hutt would insist upon. But as the Alliance coffers ran low while demand for supply runs skyrocketed, rather than cut their losses and move on to greener and more lucrative pastures, he and Chewie had nevertheless remained.

When pushed, Han had spouted any number of reasons to explain his sticking around. Some days it was because Chewie liked it there, others it was because the Alliance provided a good place to lay low until he could scrape together the necessary funds, or that the supply runs widened his own network of connections. But while all of these explanations rang some version of true, the one reason he never admitted aloud to anyone, not even himself, was his inability to leave Leia. And the more that fantasy of _Leia and Han_ blossomed in his heart, the more distant the whole Jabba mess had become in his mind.

Until recently. Until Ord Mantell.

Ord Mantell had been a serious reminder that Jabba's good graces—what few he possessed—had worn dangerously thin. The stakes were higher than ever: as high as Han's life and possibly now Leia's as well. And while Han had gotten used to ducking and diving around the fallout from his own devil-may-care decisions, he wouldn't stand by and watch anyone else bear the brunt of those consequences—least of all Leia.

He'd be damned if _he'd_ be the source of any more pain for her. Leia had already suffered more unfathomable hurt in her very young life than most people did in a lifetime— _hells,_ in a hundred lifetimes. Han was reminded of this nearly every time they made love, as his lips and hands took quiet note of the scars that marred the smooth ivory of her tender skin: living testaments to her extraordinary selflessness in her crusade to save the galaxy, waged on the private battleground of her body. He scoffed when he compared it to his own medal of honor that Leia herself had publicly bestowed on him, for little more than essentially saving his own hide, by his own estimation. He did, however, feel tremendous pride in the private acclaim Leia lavished on him when she draped her quivering thighs around his neck and sang out his name with breathless moans, as he tried single handedly to make up for the immense hurt the galaxy had inflicted upon her.

 _Why, in all of the nine hells of Corellia, did you not leave when you had the chance?_ After returning to Hoth in the wake of the Ord Mantell encounter, he should have dropped off the princess, kept the engines hot, and set a course straight for Tatooine. He _had_ tried to leave then, but fate, life, bad luck, whatever one chose to call it, had intervened.

 _Just had to get something started with her now, didn't you, Slick? What the fuck were you thinking?_ Glancing down at himself, he knew that _thinking_ had had very little to do with his decision. But while it would be easy to fault his cock, which had always voted enthusiastically and frequently in favor of staying, he knew that his heart was likely the more culpable organ in this case. Cursing himself, he curled his hands into tight fists and slammed them against the shower wall with an enraged grunt.

 _So what the fuck to do now?_ He had already spent many an hour in the cockpit, alone, surrounded by the vastness of space, triangulating this problem over and over like a lightspeed calculation he could solve in some logical fashion. But so far a _good_ solution—one where he and Leia remained alive and together—eluded his grasp. He continued to shift around the variables, but the one constant in this equation was that he _had_ to keep Leia safe. That meant leaving in order to protect her.

But after three long years spent convincing her that he could be trusted with the care and handling of her bruised and battered heart, how could he turn around and say _Sorry Sweetheart, 's been great but gotta go?_ Which was the better ante? Gamble with her life or her heart? The image of Leia's braid lying limp and lifeless across his useless body flashed through his mind, and he shuddered as fingers of cold fear gripped his spine again.

Han continued to stand under the spray of grayish water until his stark fear began to diminish, but an uneasy despair took its place as the water ran cold. Slamming his hand on the water controls, he listened momentarily as the abrupt quiet assailed him, but it only magnified the cacophony building within him like an echo chamber. He stepped out of the shower to towel off in the frigid air as he tried to shake himself free from the distress that seemed hellbent on claiming him tonight.

As Han rubbed the towel over his head, he spotted his sleep pants and shirt crumpled in a corner on the floor. They had been abandoned there weeks ago when Leia, with eager hands and an offer to scrub his back and any other hard-to-reach places, had stripped him bare, in every sense of the word.

Snatching up the sleep clothes and pulling them on to preserve the fading warmth of the shower, Han switched off the fresher light before opening the hatch to the cabin, hoping that Leia had fallen back asleep.

As the hatch to the cabin slid open, he noticed that the cabin lights had been turned up again, and he could see Leia watching him, her dark eyes shining at him with a poorly masked look of concern. "Feel better now?" she inquired.

"Yeah," he lied. "What're you doing up, Sweetheart? Ankle bothering you? You need more pain meds?"

"No, it's fine, just hurry and get in," she insisted.

"Maybe I should go sleep in the med bunk. Give you more room," Han proposed, dragging a hand through his damp hair.

"You'll do no such thing. I need that famous hot Corellian blood of yours to keep me warm."

"How 'bout I just get you another blanket?" he offered, hoping she might let him escape to the solitude of the cockpit to clear the aching mess in his head.

"Captain, get in this bunk. That is an order! And hurry up, before you get cold again." Throwing back the sheets and blankets, Leia began to scoot to the bulkhead to make room for him in the cramped bunk.

With no easy recourse, Han adjusted the cabin lights back to the dark glow of the night setting and climbed into the bunk, settling onto his back near the edge as Leia arranged the multitude of blankets over them both. After getting them both tucked in, she remained on her side, propping herself on her elbow to face him.

Han could almost hear the thoughts buzzing in her head but was surprised when no questions came from her. He turned towards her, stretching to give a hasty kiss to her forehead and mumble "night, Leia," before turning onto to his side with his back to her.

When Han had finally settled on his side, he felt Leia slip closer to press the smooth warmth of her body to his back, wrapping her arm around his torso under the sheets, her lips near his ear. "Han, what's wrong? Is everything okay?"

"Sure, doesn't everything seem okay to you?" he muttered half-heartedly into the pillow. "Just really beat, Leia. Been a helluva day and wanna get some sleep."

"You don't seem like your usual charming self tonight. Are you worried about the _Falcon_? You know this rust bucket will come through. She always does."

His heart clenched at her defense of his beloved but misfit ship. Leia clearly knew something was bothering him and was trying to make him feel better if she was complimenting the _Falcon_.

After a long pause, he finally admitted, " 's not the _Falcon_ I'm worried about."

"Then what are you... _me?_ I'm fine, Han, it's just a sprain and a few bruises. It'll all be fine in a few days."

Turning back around to face her at last, Han was grateful for the cover of the dark to hide the cracks that surely threatened his well-honed Sabacc face. "Not so sure 'bout that, Leia. I…" he broke off. Swallowing the knot of fear lodged in his throat, he continued. "I just don't want to hurt you, Sweetheart. Ever."

Han felt her fingers slide tenderly into his hair, stroking his head as she whispered " _Amant_ , what is it? This is more than me hurting my foot, isn't it?"

At the sound of the Corellian endearment - _Sweetheart -,_ Han felt something inside him crack. The torrent of worry and despair he had been holding back began to seep through his crumbling defenses.

But he couldn't bring himself to tell her about his nightmare. That would lead to the inevitable discussion about him leaving. Han knew that conversation was coming sooner rather than later, as they slowly but inevitably made their way closer to Bespin and to what lay beyond. The looming idea of _what happens next_ already hovered, trapped in the stale recycled air of the _Falcon_. He knew Leia thought about it, likely as much as he did, sensing it in her unsettled mood at times. But their unspoken pact to preserve the hard-fought sense of joy and discovery between them for as long as possible had kept that particular conversation at bay so far.

Han reached over to stroke his thumb across her cheek in response to her query, unwilling to give a voice to his fears—as if keeping them confined to his head would keep them unrealized.

Without a word, Leia wrapped her slender fingers around his and gently pulled his hand away from her cheek. She turned from her side onto her back and scooted up towards the head of the bunk, switching on the dim overhead bunk light. Opening her arms to him, she patted her hand over her heart in invitation.

Unable to resist his overwhelming need for her comfort any longer, Han moved to settle his aching head on her chest, draping his body close beside hers but careful of placing the entirety of his weight on her. This position had become a familiar one, although it was usually Han cradling Leia's tear-streaked face on his bare chest after she awoke, distraught in the night.

As Han nestled closer to her, she went to fold her arms around him when she gave small exasperated sigh. Reaching behind her head, Leia pulled out her braid that had become trapped under their entwined bodies, running it down over her shoulder and along the side of her torso. As they settled into a comfortable position, Leia pulled the blankets up over Han's back and resumed the delicate weaving of her fingers through the damp strands of his hair, dropping intermittent kisses onto the top of his head.

Han began to calm with the reassuring rhythm of her heart and reached a tentative hand for her braid, running his fingertips along the silky grooves of its long length.

"Your hair... so beautiful, Sweetheart," came his hoarse whisper.

Han curled his fingers around the end of her braid and began to coil the braid's length loosely around his hand, as if wrapping an injured hand. He was struck by the strength inherent in her thick plait, knowing how soft and fine her hair felt when it tumbled down on him when she let him to unravel it.

He had seen the time she devoted every day to her hair and had wondered more than once why such a practically-minded person would maintain such an impracticality in the midst of a chaotic existence.

Han let his thoughts tumble out. "Have always wondered why you keep it though. Isn't your hair just a big nuisance for you?"

After a little huffing laugh followed by a long pause, Leia started to explain. "When I was younger, I did hate it. It was such an annoyance. Someone always fussing over it, pulling and twisting and pinning. I threatened to cut it off so many times and be done with it. But I wasn't allowed to cut off the 'pride of the Organas', as my mother called it. I vowed to myself that I would, one day."

Leia's voice softened. "And now, I could do it and no one is around to stop me, if I wanted to. But every time I braid my hair, I can't help but think of my mother. She would often braid it for me and showed me how to wrap the braids around my head. My 'crown', she called it when I was little. It was the only way to get me to sit still for it. When I was older, she told me it had always helped her to remember that a queen must carry the burdens of her people upon her head."

Tightening his grip on her braid, Han brought it to his lips for a reverent kiss. It was her one remaining artifact from the history of her very few years, a beautiful but fragile tether to her erstwhile life. Unfortunately he knew, had _seen_ , how it could also alter her future as well.

"But it makes you so recognizable, Sweetheart. Might as well paint a target on your back - could even get you killed one day. Is it worth your life?"

Leia hesitated, as if deliberating. "Sometimes, on my darkest days, I close my eyes and just try to remember her hands working through my hair again. Mama was the only one who could wrap my braids just right, so they would stay in place but were still comfortable to wear all day. I wouldn't dream of cutting it off now. I just, couldn't…" Her voice trailed off for a moment.

She reached down to his whiskered chin, brushing her thumb over his scar, and then placed her finger under his chin to gently tip his face up. Leia waited until Han hesitantly dragged his eyes up to meet hers and locked her eyes with his. " _Some_ things are just worth the effort and the risk, worth fighting for to keep in your life, Han. No matter what kind of _nuisance_ they may be at times."

Then with a small smile and eyes shining at him, she added, "Besides, my hair _does_ come in handy at times. It kept my ears warm on Hoth, and looks like I will need it now on this ice cube of a ship."

He sputtered a choked laugh at last and saw her smile dimple in response to his laugh.

"I'll be ok, Han. _We'll_ be ok," she whispered.

Han stared at her dark, hopeful eyes in awe, as both the crux of his problem and the answer to it crystallized within them. Gods, but he loved her; he could finally admit that to himself without a shudder of doubt or hesitation. He loved her and every fierce, beautiful part of her: her fire and her ice, her naive zealotry and her age-old wisdom, her dedication to peace and her rallying cry in battle, her girlish innocence and her killer's instinct, her sweet lips and her sharp tongue. How had he ever thought he could leave her? Leia, a princess who had nothing, was offering him everything. How could he say no to the offer of a lifetime, or rather, the offer _for_ a lifetime?

Han slipped his arms easily around her small frame, tightening his hold on her. Couldn't they just stay here in this cramped mess of a cabin, locked away from the galaxy? Throw the _princess_ and the _guy like me_ out the airlock to distract their band of pursuers and let _Leia_ and _Han_ fly far away, beyond the realm of more pain and suffering?

 _We'll_ _be ok_ , she'd assured him. Leia seemed sure of this possibility, as sure as she was of her ability to topple the rule of the Empire. Han didn't have any idea how she could be so sure of this, but then many unthinkable things somehow always seemed possible with her, or so he had come to discover.

Pulling her even closer, as if he could somehow weld them together in an unbreakable bond, Han began to roll them onto their side when Leia let out a little yelp. He loosened his embrace and pulled back a bit to peer at her. "Sorry, beautiful. You got me carried away, as usual. Ankle still hurt? I'd better take another look at it."

Han rolled away from her to the edge of the bunk, propping himself on his side and leaning on one arm to watch as Leia wiggled herself closer to the head of the bunk and threw back the covers to expose her legs.

When she looked at him with an expectant gaze, Han splayed his free hand over her belly and stretched to give her a tender kiss. He was happy to find her lips and body warm, now that she was no longer protected by the mound of blankets. He continued to rain light kisses down on her, soon finding himself unable to pull his attention away from the comfort of her soft lips, and his hand began to roam absentmindedly over her loose shirt to ensure her warmth, as he waded further into the beckoning depths of the solace he so often found in her.

When his hand mindlessly grazed her breast, Han felt her nipple harden in response to his touch. A low growl escaped him when his thumb brushed back over her nipple in delicate reconnaissance, igniting his own arousal. His hand slipped down to slide under the hem of her shirt, making way for his mouth to claim the irresistible peaks of her breasts visible under the loose fabric. His fingertips moved with clear sensual intent, teasing along the waist of her pants as they amassed like ready soldiers awaiting orders. When his lips followed the urgent southward trail blazed by his hand and lingered on the pale skin of her exposed belly, he felt a hand slide in his hair.

"Han?" He glanced up at her to find her face with a telltale flush rising in her cheeks but still mocking him with a raised eyebrow. "I thought you were going to look at my ankle?"

Ablaze with the dual heats of his love and lust for her, Han whispered back, "I'm gonna kiss it and make it all better, Your Worship". He hooked his fingers into the waist of her pants and slipped them gently down her legs.

As he buried his nose into the soft riot of curls between her legs with a heated sigh, she breathed back in a shaky tone, "Han, how is this going to help my ankle?"

Leia gasped when he responded with the insistent tip of his tongue. As her gasp gave way to a low moan, Han looked up at her and smirked.

"Old Corellian remedy, Sweetheart", he said, tenderly coaxing her thighs apart. "All that hot blood comes in handy too at times like this," and with a wink, Han bowed his head, determined to honor his promise to keep her warm.


	3. Chapter 3 - Unravelling

_This is dedicated to the one I love, the one we ALL love, our dear KnightedRogue. She shares her enormous Corellian-size talents with us freely and magnanimously, smiting down half of her readers in her wake, Thanos-style, every time her Ladyship deems to drop her words on us. Just a little something to make YOUR Friday extra special, KR, for a change - you demanded a braid ficlet, so ye shall have it…_

 _Mucho kudos to my beta-reader and master pruner, AmongstEmeraldClouds, for her time, patience, insights, know-how, and, best of all, her endless supply of good humor._

* * *

They were surrounded by nothing but vastness - dark winking space, and time not bound by demands. Long hours with little to do, as their not-so trusty ship conveyed them ever so slowly towards an unfamiliar pinpoint on a starchart.

Having become experts at banter and sparring with words over the past three years, it came as little surprise that Han and Leia had naturally - _finally_ \- moved on to playing and teasing each other's bodies as well. Wrestling for control, taking pride in pushing the other's buttons, eliciting curses and oaths and heated expressions...

Tonight, he had surprised her as she disrobed for bed, her hands tangled in the oversized shirt as she wrestled it over her head. She jumped as he gave the garment an impatient yank and then moved close behind as if to shelter her from the onslaught of the cabin's chill. She looked down at his tanned hands cradling the pale cool of her breasts, spellbound as the half moons of his thumbs demanded the unswerving attention of her nipples. Heard him unleash a low predatory growl buried within his throat, bemoaning that day's long separation from her, to give proper attention due his other love. Felt the unabashed heat of what seemed to be his unquenchable desire, radiating against the curve of her back. Moved for him, as he shuffled them towards the bunk, accompanied by the clink of belt buckle and rustle of clothes. Knelt on the bunk's edge, bending forward at the gentle insistence of his palm on her back, his hands finally settling on the yoke of her hips to guide his own forward as he plotted their course, hurtling them through the creation of their own time and space…

Afterwards, she lay light-headed and hoarse. She hoped she hadn't disturbed the other living inhabitant of the ship with her desperate cries for Han, and was already red-cheeked at the thought of facing the Wookiee over next morning's panna cakes. But while she still thrummed from the sear of Han's body curved around hers, it was her eyes that were bereaved, having been robbed of the sight of his body in erotic service to her own. His riotous mess of hair that seemed the barometer of his state of mind. The symphony of movements in his torso, muscles flexing and twisting in concert to ignite the ever-smoldering coals of their passion into a roaring blaze. His face, surely stamped with a determined concentration as he chased their entwined pleasure.

The sleep she tumbled into was uneasy, her mind taunting with vivid imaginings of what she had been unable to see. She awakened, trying to soothe her ache by letting her gaze rake over his sleeping form in greedy recompense. At the sight of his beautiful still frame, she reached down to gather in her long single night braid, and dipping the tip into the ink of her still-lit desire, she set about applying it to the canvas laid out before her.

Starting with the finest of brush strokes, she dabbed the point of her braid into the crevasse of his chin to dust over his scar, delighting in the twitch of his full lips. She kept her touch soft as she slid it with slow deliberation over his chin and flicked it over his Adam's apple. She watched the prominent peak recoil upwards, in evasive maneuvers - surely by now he should have known she would _not_ allow for such an easy escape, she mused. She had to fight the urge to lick and taste that hard male fruit always on easy display, especially knowing how it would reverberate with a surefire moan when she branded him with teasing lips.

She took mercy on his Adam's apple and dragged the tip of her braid down into the small hollow at the base of his throat, the gateway to the broad expanse of his chest. Her thick dark bristle swept down to mingle amongst the bramble of sandy blonde hair that protected what she now knew to be a pair of exquisitely sensitive nipples. She dabbled lightly in places and applied broad strong strokes in others, as the artist in her saw fit.

As she deliberated her next choices, she took note of the quickening in his strong chest, as if silently begging for a more liberal application in those areas. A glance up at Han's pillow showed eyes closed but underlined by a telltale smile, suggesting he was in the midst of swapping his dream state for a far superior real-life fantasy.

Leia zigzagged her braid down the long expanse of his torso, feathering it across the rippled shoals of his abdomen, making a quick detour to plumb the depth of his navel, which was disrupted by the answering quiver in his belly.

She continued tracing a delicate southward trail, stopping just short of the expected prize awaiting her attention - what Han proudly deemed his Corellian Morning Glory. _Bad luck to let it go to waste, Sweetheart,_ he had often warned her.

Swapping tools, she discarded her long-haired brush for the finer implement of her tongue to free his moan of anticipation that she had finely built and rightfully expected as downpayment for her artistry. She continued to exact an exorbitant fee from him, filling the coffer of the tiny cabin with his gasping breaths, the delayed echoes of her own keening cries from earlier in the night. Her rhythm finally broke when his hand splayed across the crown of her head.

"Ride me," demanded his husky rumble, although his pleading eyes told the tale of his mighty need. "I wanna watch you."

Resting her chin on his belly for a moment, she smiled up at him, but instead of rising to fulfill his wish, she paused before reaching again for the end of her braid. Keeping her eyes fixed on his, burning with gold glinting want, she loosened the fastener at the end of her braid and began a slow unwinding of the glossy strands. She watched his eyes glower with lustful jealousy at her own hands as she went about the unhurried work of dismantling the braid, a privilege that she had until recently reserved for him.

When at last the long locks unravelled, she moved to kneel by his side. Combing her fingers through her freed mane, she swept her hair forward, half of it over each shoulder. Two chesnut curtains fanned out across her chest and fell well past her waist, leaving only a sliver of pale skin down her middle available to needful eyes.

She positioned herself above him at last, moving with all the majesty of the royal monarch she was groomed to become, sinking down on him as if seating herself atop the throne of her ascension. The wail that escaped her, to join Han's groan from beneath her, was most certainly not one borne of royal etiquette or upbringing, however.

From her new vantage she surveyed her conquered dominion - the powerful heave of his breaths as he tried to reclaim those she had stolen from him, the amazed rapture on his face when he found himself snug inside of her at last - all that she had imagined as she had bent before him earlier in the night. Now, she wallowed in Han's mirroring gaze roving over her with a voracious heat.

"I wanna see _all_ of you, Sweetheart," he murmured, reaching up his hands to unveil her breasts. She caught his hands with her own before they could reveal what she had obscured, and saw his brow furrow in bafflement. Without a word, she grasped his palms with her own and laced their fingers together, pushing back on his arms while straightening her own. Braced above him, she began a languid rolling of her hips, revelling in the decadent feel of him inside her, as was now her selfish custom.

Reminding herself of the task at hand, her hips found an urgent and merciless rhythm. As she deepened her movements, she arched her back, forcing the rosy peaks of her cloistered breasts to breach the cascades of brown shimmer silk with the crest of each thrust.

With her head thrown back, she could only hear Han's strangled _fuck_ escape him, and exult in listening to his smirking _Sweethearts_ give way to gasping _Leias_.


End file.
